Cake or gum? 1977 Jim Palmer

Cake won the last 1976 matchup, 8-2. Who will kick off 1977 with a win?

Hostess goes with a simple spring training portrait of Palmer, while Topps gives us an action shot a Memorial Stadium with a red-orange Orioles jersey. One of the greatest pitchers of all time, Palmer won at least 20 games for eight out of nine seasons from 1970-1978. He twice led the league in ERA, and his 2.86 career ERA is third lowest since 1920. He was a six-time All Star and won three Cy Young Awards. In his 19-year career he never allowed a grand slam or back-to-back home runs. In 558 games he went 268-152 with 2,212 strikeouts. Well-known for a variety of advertising and commercial appearances, most notably for Jockey, Palmer has been an Orioles and national TV announcer since his 1984 retirement.
 

Wood vs. Wood #271

 Last time 1962 squeaked by with a 6-5 win. Who will come out on top here?

Hatless Ray Ripplemeyer poses in spring training in his Cincinnati Redlegs pinstripes. Originally signed by the Braves in 1954, Ray Rippelmeyer finally made his major league debut with the Senators in 1962. He pitched in 18 games in his only big league season, going 1-2 with a 5.49 ERA. After his playing career he was a long time minor league coach and owned a farm in Illinois. He died in 2022.

Mike Brown hangs out in the dugout of Tiger Stadium. He had been an August trade acquisition from Boston. Brown pitched for the Red Sox and Mariners from 1982 to 1987. In 61 games (42 starts) he went 12-20 with a 5.75 ERA. After his playing career he was a long time minor league coach and scout for several organizations. He retired after the 2020 season.
 

1974 Topps Deckle Dating - Jon Matlack

Mets pitcher Jon Matlack at spring training.

April 2, 1973 in St. Petersburg.

The back image comes from Kevin Savage Auctions. This went for only $14, by far the cheapest I've seen one of these go for.

This is the same date they give for the Tom Seaver card, which I suspect was incorrect. If that date was wrong, I can't feel terribly confident about this one either.

 

1981 Topps Andre Thornton

 

The front: Nice spring training shot for Thornton.

The back: This is an error card; Thornton's cycle was on April 22, 1978, not 1979.

The player: Andre Thornton was a good-hitting first baseman for the Cubs, who developed into a great hitter with the Indians in the late 1970s. He missed the 1980 season due to a knee injury, but came back for several solid seasons as a DH before retiring after the 1987 season. Thornton had three season of 32+ HR and 99+ RBI. The two-time All-Star played in 1,565 games over 14 seasons, hitting .254 with 253 HR and 895 RBI. He walked 876 times, more than his 851 strikeouts.

The man: For over 20 years Thornton has been CEO of ASW Global, an Akron-based 3PL supply chain services company with over 100 employees. He is also on the board of several charitable organizations.

My collection: I have 40 of his cards, from 1974 to 1988. I would be interested in trading for 1979 Hostess #93.
 

Roundup follow-up

So last Friday I did a roundup post, and mentioned that I'd gotten one PWE from robglessner of TCDB a week prior but was still waiting on another one. Guess what arrived later that day? Nice mix of vintage cards (the '59 Lollar, which is in very nice shape, is up for trade, as I'd goofed in my TCDB list and already had the card) and 80's oddballs.

The last of my incoming 2025s came in from tommystokes1976. I'm down to needing two cards to knock off Series I: #20 Coby Mayo and #74 Dylan Crews. Anyone got these for trade? As far as I know neither of these are big-name propsects.

jbostic sent this fun mix with a lot of wacky photos from the days when card companies still did that. That '98 UD card is not a victim of being stuck to another card; that's Rockies catcher Kirt Manwaring running through an early-April snow.

Vintage trades don't come around often on TCDB but I was able to swing a nice one with JJDaddio.

OBC's Joe Isaac surprised me with five fabulous fifties cards.

Finally, another terrific Time Travel Trade with Diamond Jesters. It's a bit Mets heavy, but I do love Polo Grounds shots with Manhattan apartment buildings in the background, like on the '81 TCMA Duke Snider, and the Home Run Apple is a cool card too. Adding a couple of needed cards from my first football card set ('86 Topps) was great too.

 

1976 SSPC Cesar Cedeno

 

The card, in brief: Cedeno shows off a full red/orange/yellow rainbow as he swings for the photographer. Not sure who the lurker is with the long sideburns - there were a lot of players with that style in 1975.

Playing career, in brief: Cedeno came up with the Astros as a 19-year-old rookie in 1970 and quickly became a star. An exciting combination of power and speed, he led the NL in doubles in 1971 and 1972. In both 1972 and 1973, he hit .320 with 20+ HR and 50+ steals. That December, he was charged with involuntary manslaughter when he was playing with a gun with a 19-year-old woman in his hotel room; the gun went off, killing the woman. Cedeno served 20 days in jail and was fined $100. Though still a productive player for many years, he did not put up the same kind of numbers after that incident. Overall, in 17 seasons, mostly for the Astros, Cedeno hit .285 with 199 HR, 976 RBI and 550 SB.

Post-playing career, in brief: After his career he was arrested once for drunk driving and twice for domestic abuse. He had a long coaching career for several organizations, mostly the Astros, and was inducted into the Astros Hall of Fame in 2020.

My collection: I have 44 of his cards, from 1971 to 1986. I would be interested in trading for 1971 Topps Super #15.

Topps Big Cartoon Deep Dive: 1988 Ernie Whitt

Ernie Whitt bats in a spring training game against the Tigers. Great photo except for cropping off the heads of the fans in the stands.

The first two cartoons are routine - power hitter, good defense.

The last is the interesting one. Lots of players owned a restaurant, some even owned two. Mother's Pizza Parlour and Spaghetti House, which first opened in Hamilton, ON in 1970, was one of the largest restaurant chains in Canada, with over 100 stores in the 1980s. 

In 1987, a four-person investor group, including Whitt, bought 15 of the stores for $9.8 million. For several years before that Whitt had been involved in promotions for the chain, which had an "Ernie Whitt Special" for deliveries.

Though Whitt was the big baseball investor in the chain, and the face tied to promotions, several other Blue Jays - Jesse Barfield, Lloyd Moseby, Cito Gaston - were persuaded by Whitt to become limited partners in Mother's.

The Blue Jays players' investment did not pay off; in 1989 the chain went into receivership, and was purchased by Little Caesars. Though the last of the chain closed in the early 1990s, the Mother's trademark was bought by an entrepreneur who attempted to reintroduce the chain in the 2010s. Four locations were opened between 2013 and 2016, and all were closed by 2019. However, Mother's Pizza can be purchased at two Ontario ghost kitchens and on board all flights by small Canadian carrier Flair Airlines.
 

Blog Bat Around: Top 10 Junk Wax sets

Following up on Collective Mind, Fuji and Night Owl: Here is my very subjective ranking of junk-wax era sets, based primarily on how I felt about them at the time. My collecting years as a kid were 1987-1993, perfectly encapsulating the junk wax era. While in my earlier years collecting was a very social endeavor, with kids trading cards in school all the time, by the time I got to high school in 1991, card collecting was something I kept to myself. There were still plenty of cards available in drug stores and other retail places, so I never went to actual baseball card stores. Therefore I only ever knew the main brands: Topps, Donruss, Fleer, Score, Upper Deck, and Sportflics. I didn't know of the existence of brands like Pinnacle, Ultra or Stadium Club until years later, so they are not included in my ranking.

10. 1992 Score.

This is more to get Score on the list then anything else. I liked the cards well enough but the action photography was very repetitive, and the long card backs felt like homework to read. 1992 is my favorite of the score designs, I like the colorful side bar, so this is Score's representative in the ranking.

9. 1993 Donruss

Similar to Score, Donruss was a brand I liked but never loved. My favorite parts were the player's full name and full transaction on the back. To me the 1993 set felt totally different, a copy of Upper Deck in a good way.

8.  1987 Sportflics

I personally considered Sportflics a major brand, though the packs were more expensive so I only got a few a year. 1987 was my favorite as the one year they really leaned into having three successive action shots, which I felt made best use of the lenticular effect.

7. 1991 Fleer

I actually like yellow, and beyond that, this set had really good photography, and personally I like a design where the photo is in a perfect rectangle. 1990 Donruss almost made the ranking for just that reason.

6. 1988 Fleer

I missed out on the quirky early years of Fleer, and the junk was era had a lot of really boring Fleer sets. 1988 had a fun design with the red-white-and-blue motif, and some of the best photography of the era, with some last gasps of Fleer quirkiness.

5. 1993 Upper Deck

I didn't intend to make the top half all UD and Topps, it just worked out that way when I made a list and sorted it. UD was always a favorite for action photography that was still fun and interesting. 1993 makes the list for shaking up the formula a bit, with photos even better than before.

4. 1993 Topps

1993 was the last year I collected cards until the early 2000s, so this was the last set that I collected a substantial amount from. 1993s were the newest cards in my collection for many years, and most of them were Topps, so this always felt a little more special. It's a nice design with good photos, too.

3. 1989 Upper Deck

The first four years of Upper Deck were all very similar, so going with the set that started it all and began the craze of ramping up card quality.

2. 1991 Topps

This was Topps's answer to Upper Deck; a set that had a fresh spin on baseball photography while still keeping the overall Topps look and feel. It was disappointing to see a lackluster follow-up in 1992.

1. 1987 Topps

I am one of many, many collectors for whom this was the set that got them into collecting. Probably more lifelong collectors were created by this set than any other. The woodgrain design gave it a classy feel, the photos were interesting, and the write-ups on the back gave the player character. Nine Pockets just wrote a really great homage to the set which captures my feelings better than I could have written it. The next three years of Topps sets felt a little clunky and goofy in comparison to this one.

Cake or gum? 1976 Cesar Geronimo

Last time was an easy 10-1 victory for Topps. Will this one be closer?

Hostess has Geronimo at spring training, with his long name extending well past the shoulder on his jersey. Topps has him at Candlestick park, with the stadium and scoreboard in the background.

Originally a Yankees prospect, Geronimo was a Rule V selection by the Astros in 1969. After three years in Houston with little playing time, he was a throw-in in the trade that sent Joe Morgan to the Reds. Though never a star like Morgan, Geronimo developed into an integral part of the Big Red Machine. The center fielder won four straight Gold Gloves from 1974 to 1977. In his best years he hit for some average with doubles power and a little speed. His production tailed off significantly when he turned 30 in 1978. He ended his career with three seasons as a backup outfielder in KC. Overall in 1,522 games he hit .258 with 161 doubles, 51 HR, 392 RBI and 82 SB. After his playing career, he was involved in many coaching and development endeavors in his native Dominican Republic. He is now retired.

Wood vs. Wood #269

Last time the two cards battled to a 4-4 tie. Will there be a winner here?

Bob Oldis gives off an intense stare on his card. He's listed as a Phillie, though the black and gold on his jersey give away that this was a Pirates uniform. Bob Oldis played fifteen years of pro baseball, with major league stints for the Senators (24 games '53-'55), Pirates (26 games '60-'61) and Phillies (85 games '62-'63). He played in the 1960 World Series for Pittsburgh, winning his first World Series ring. In 135 games he hit .237 with 1 HR and 22 RBI. After his playing career ended in 1964 he spent 55 more years in baseball as a coach and mostly a scout. He won his second World Series ring with the Marlins in 2003, and retired only when COVID hit in 2020. Oldis, who now lives in Arizona, recently turned 97 and is currently the fifth-oldest living baseball player.

Cliff Speck looks as relaxed as Oldis looks intense, lounging in the bullpen. Speck played 12 years in the minors before finally reaching the majors for what would be his only big league season in 1986; the back of his card is a long list of minor league stops across cities and organizations. He pitched in the Yankees organization in '87 and '88, so he was also a fifteen-year pro baseball player, but his brief Atlanta stint was his only one in the majors. In 13 games he went 2-1 with a 4.13 ERA. He is now a dispatcher for Wilhelm Trucking in Portland, OR.